A Prairie Home Companion

Oh, hear that old piano, from down the avenue
I smell the roses, I look around for you
My sweet, sweet old someone, comin' through that door
It's Saturday, the band is playin',
Honey, could we ask for more?

My freshman year in college, 1982, and I'm gathered with a family in a house in a forest. We're listening to A Prairie Home Companion on the radio - my first experience of what would become a lifelong Saturday evening or Sunday morning tradtion.

I look back and realize I've been listening to Garrison Keillor for almost 20 years now. His voice has accompanied me from college to blind wanderings about the country to career building ambitions in foreign lands. I can't say how many things in my life have remained the same for twenty years. Media has changed, that is for certain. We used to record the program with cassette tapes. Now I have a CD Player and am seriously considering a DVD Player. And the web! What a great idea!!

But what has stayed the same? Well, the last trip I took to Florida I was on an airplane that was built in 1972. So American Airlines hasn't changed.

My friends from those years have grown away from me. Or I grew away from them. Most likely, it's a mutual thing.

My family has evolved. About ten new children have been born into my family since my freshman year in college.

Same, same - must think of what is the same. But it's all so different!! Even I am different. Thankfully, happily different. What is the same?

Time hasn't changed. Minutes, hours, days, years have not gone metric. The trees haven't changed - they are still elms, oaks, etc. But their number and health is changing.